Music in the Mountains to host Yale Violinist this Friday, June 24

Music in the Mountains (MIM) with their SummerFest Festival Orchestra and Chorus, will present the Brahms Requiem along with The Lark Ascending by Vaughan Williams at the Center for the Arts in Grass Valley, CA on Friday, June 24th 2022 with concert violinist, Tai Murray from Yale School of Music and featured soloists, Baritone Efrain Solis and Soprano Carrie Hennessey.

Violinist Tai Murray has been described by The Philadelphia Inquirer as “a violinist with more than technique on her mind” and a musician of “exceptional assurance and style.” A winner of the 2004 Avery Fisher Career Grant, Murray has appeared in recitals and with major ensembles around the world including the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra, Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra, Chicago Symphony Orchestra, and the Los Angeles Philharmonic. Murray is an Assistant Professor, Adjunct, of Violin at the Yale School of Music, where she teaches applied violin and coaches chamber music. She earned artist diplomas from Indiana University’s Jacobs School of Music and The Juilliard School. 

Soprano Carrie Hennessey is consistently thrilling audiences and critics in opera and concert appearances around the world, known for her soaring voice and richly nuanced characters. About this wonderful soprano, “A vivid star in the title role, Hennessey brought a wondrous blend of silvery tone and sinuous phrasing to her assignment,” noted Joshua Kosman of the San Francisco Chronicle. 

Ms. Hennessey performed the inaugural season of the Capitol Public Radio Garden Concert Series, as soloist of operatic arias with the Cleveland philharmonic, the world premiere of Bones of Girls by librettist, Cristina Fríes and composer, Ryan Suleiman, with The Rogue Music Project. Ms. Hennessey continues to actively support music education through lectures, workshops and Master Classes in the communities in which she works, as well as nurturing a thriving private vocal studio. She is currently in the process of writing a one woman show about her early life in singing, walking away from a singing career for 12 years and coming back to create a unique, versatile and vibrant performing and teaching career. 

Baritone Efrain Solis is an alumnus of the prestigious Merola Opera Program in association with San Francisco Opera. A former member of Opera Santa Barbara’s Studio Artist Program, in 2013, he was a Grand Finalist in the Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions and a finalist in Houston Grand Opera’s Eleanor McCollum Competition. He holds a Master of Music from San Francisco Conservatory of Music and a Bachelor of Music from Chapman University.

MIM Artistic Director and Conductor, Ryan Murray, notes the Brahms Requiem among one of his favorite pieces of music ever written. From the program notes about the music, Brahms crafted the Requiem to alternate between texts, offering comfort and those confronting life’s frailty. In the center–movement 4–we dwell in the house of the Lord, and at the end, we rest from our hard work. The result is a symmetry in the thematic structure.

Friday’s program also features Ralph Vaughan Williams’ The Lark Ascending, which in 2021, was voted the favorite piece of classical music for a record eleventh time, by the Classic FM Hall of Fame. The piece was inspired by Victorian poet George Meredith’s poem by the same name. The work for string instruments is meant to conjure in the listener’s mind images of a

lark ascending in the British countryside.

For lovers of live music performances, and especially for those who are invested in high-quality classical music, this concert will be a rare and rich experience.  Music in the Mountains is celebrating their Ruby Anniversary and the milestone of bringing SummerFest and professional classical music to the Nevada County Community for more than 40 years.  

Music in the Mountains is a platinum-star-rated nonprofit organization that pairs world-class musical performances with a deep commitment to music education. Tickets for all SummerFest concerts are available at http://www.musicinthemountains.org or by calling the MIM box office at 530-265-6124.